1 Samuel xxviii. 7.-"BEHOLD, THERE IS A WOMAN THAT HATH A

1665. Endor. As we approached Endor we could fancy the very walk which Saul took over the eastern shoulder of the hill to reach the witch's abode, skirting Little Hermon, on the front slopes of which the Philistines were encamped, in order to reach the village behind them; a long and weary distance from his own army by the fountain of Jezreel, on the side of Gilboa. It might be fancy, but the place has a strange, weird-like aspect; a miserable village on the north side of the hill, without a tree or a shrub to relieve the squalor of its decaying heaps. It is full of caves, and the mud-built hovels are stuck on to the sides of the rocks in clusters, and are, for the most part, a mere continuation or enlargement of the cavern behind, which forms the larger portion of the human den. The inhabitants were the most filthy and ragged we had seen; and as the old crones, startled at the rare apparition of strangers strolling near their holes, came forth and cursed us, a Holman Hunt might have immortalized on canvas the very features of the necromancer of Israel. Endor has shrunk from its former extent; and there are many caves around, with crumbling heaps at their mouths, the remains, probably, of what once were other habitations.-Tristram's "The Land of Israel."

Ephesians ii. 9.-"NOT OF WORKS, LEST ANY MAN SHOULD BOAST.”

1666. Good Works.-" God," said a minister to a boy who stood watching a caterpillar spinning a very beautiful cocoon-"God sets that little creature a task to do, and diligently and skilfully he does it; and so God gives us good works to perform in His name and for His sake. But were the insect to remain satisfied for ever in the silken ball which he is weaving, it would become, not his home, but his tomb. No, forcing a way through it, and not resting in it, will the winged creature reach sunshine and air. He must leave his own works behind if he would shine in freedom and joy. And so it is with the Christian. If he rest in his own works, whatever they may be, he is dead to God, and lost to glory; he is making of what he may deem virtues a barrier between himself and his Saviour."-A. L. O. E.'s “ Triumph over Midian."

1 Samuel iii. 1.-"THE WORD OF THE LORD WAS PRECIOUS IN THOSE DAYS.

1667. Regard for the Bible.-When copies of the Bible were taken to Mangaia (South Sea Islands) the joy of the people was very great. At a subsequent missionary prayer meeting, an aged disciple, after addressing the people from a text in the book of Job (chap. v., 17—19), lifted up his Bible before the whole congregation and said, “My brethren and sisters, this is my resolve; the dust shall never cover my Bible, the moth shall never eat it, the mildew shall never rot it. My light! my joy!”—Gill's “ Gems from the Coral Islands."

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Genesis xxxvii. 14.-" AND HE SAID TO HIM, GO, I PRAY THEE, SEE WHETHER IT BE WELL WITH THY BRETHREN, AND WELL WITH THE FLOCKS; AND BRING ME WORD AGAIN. SO HE SENT HIM OUT OF THE VALE OF HEBRON, AND HE CAME TO SHECHEM."

1668. Vale of Shechem.-Having crossed the hill, we entered the rich vale of Shechem, or Nablous, clad with olives, full of gardens and orange groves, with palm trees, and watered by plenteous rills. It was the brightest and most civilized scene we had met with. Passengers on horse and foot, many of them unarmed, were travelling to and fro; camels, in long file, laden with cotton bales, were mingled with asses bearing firewood and baskets of cotton husks to the city; and wild horsemen were galloping in and out as they skilfully threaded their way among the laden beasts. Jays and woodpeckers laughed among the olive trees, and a fox slunk past us to his hole; while the home-like caw of the jackdaw, whose acquaintance we had not before made in the country, was re-echoed from the poplar trees and the minarets.-Tristram's "The Land of Israel."

Psalm cxix. 71.-"IT IS GOOD FOR ME THAT I HAVE BEEN AFFLICTED.

1669. Benefit of Affliction.-It is said of a gentleman, who, from his earliest infancy to his dying hour, scarcely ever knew what perfect health was, that he looked upon this affliction as the greatest blessing of his life. The reason he assigned was, that, being naturally of a warm temper and an ambitious disposition, these visitations of Divine Providence weaned his affections from the world, and brought every passion into subjection to the divine will.

John viii. 34.

WHOSOEVER COMMITTETH SIN IS THE SERVANT OF SIN."

1670. Slavery of Sin.-Just so when the morning sun is bright, and the summer breezes gently blowing from the shore, the little river boat is enticed from the harbour to start on her trip of pleasure on the clear, calm sea. All nature seems to enlist in her service. The fair wind fills her sails, the favourable tide rolls onward in her course, the parted sea makes way for her to glide swiftly and merrily on her happy voyage. But, having thus been her servants and carried her whither she would, these soon become her masters and carry her whither she would not. The breeze that swelled her sails has become a storm, and rends them; the waves that quietly rippled for her pleasure, now rise in fury and dash over her for her destruction; and the vessel which rode in the morning as a queen upon the waters, sinks before night comes on, the slave of those very winds and waves which had beguiled her to use them as her servants.-Morse's Working for God."

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Matthew xv. 19.-"FOR OUT OF THE HEART PROCEED EVIL THOUGHTS, MURDERS, ADULTERIES, FORNICATIONS, THEFTS, FALSE WITNESS, BLASPHEMIES.

1671. Hornets in the Heart.-The Saviour does not stop to prove that these things come out of the heart. He asserts it, and asserts it because it is self-evident. When you see a thing coming forth, you are clear it was there first. Last summer I noticed hornets continually flying from a number of decayed logs in my garden. I saw them constantly flying in and out, and I did not think myself at all unreasonable in concluding that there was a hornet's nest there; and so, if we see the hornets of sin flying out of a man, we suppose at once there is sin within him.-C. H. SPURGEON.

Deuteronomy iii. 4, 5.-" AND WE TOOK ALL HIS CITIES AT THAT TIME, THERE WAS NOT A CITY WHICH WE TOOK NOT FROM THEM," &c.

1672. The Land of the Giants.-Sixty cities in one small province! Can it be true? Has not the copyist erred in his arithmetic? Should it not be sixteen, or six? Does it not appear improbable? The province mentioned, Argob, is not more than thirty miles by twenty; and that within so limited a space there should be sixty cities, "besides unwalled towns a great many," can scarcely be accepted literally.

Now it is a great blessing, for the confirmation of our faith in the truth of the Bible, and the silencing of those who delighted in making others to be of a doubtful mind, that the literal truth of the statement is fully established,-not by a comparison of parallel passages, not by a new translation of the text, not by the testimony of ancient historians, but by the remains of the cities themselves. There are they in Argob, the oldest specimens of domestic architecture in the whole world.

English travellers have visited the wild land of the giants, they have penetrated into the rocky recesses of Argob, they have slept in the deserted homes of the Rephaim, and have come back to tell us that the stones reared by those ancient idolaters bear witness to the truth of the living God.

The Rev. J. L. Porter spent a considerable time in exploring the cities of Bashan. At Burak he lodged in a city of several hundred houses, all deserted, but all in good repair, though built two or three thousand years ago. The walls of these houses were five feet thick, formed of large blocks of hewn stone put together without lime or cement of any kind. The roofs were formed of long blocks of the same black basalt, measuring twelve feet in length, eighteen inches in breadth, and six inches in thickness. The doors were stone slabs, hung upon pivots formed of projecting parts of the slabs, working in sockets in the lintel and threshold; the windows were guarded with stone shutters, everything was of stone, as if the builders had designed each edifice to last for

ever.

The cities have endured, but the inhabitants have fled. You pass the ruined gateway where stern warriors kept watch, and from whose towers the watchmen swept the country and signalled the coming of the foe; all is hushed; rank weeds and grass, brambles and creeping plants, have overgrown the well-made roads; and the massive houses, where once on a time happy groups assembled, and children shouted with joy, the fox and the jackal make their dwelling, while owls and daws take possession of the roof. Here is a city that must at one period have contained at least 20,000 inhabitants; once its streets were noisy and bustling, and the dealers made their shrewd bargains in the markets, while the grandees dwelt in their stone palaces, haughty of spirit as if the slaves who waited on them were of another flesh than theirs. Here dwelt the giants, and after them Jews, and Greeks, and Romans, Saracens and Turks, each leaving memorials of their presence; but all gone -the whole abandoned to the wild birds and the beasts of prey. There are palaces, with thorns and thistles growing in the chief room; there are temples, with branches of trees shooting through the gaping walls; there are tombs festooned with the rich luxuriance of nature ; there is everything to tell of desolation and decay.

You remember that we read in Joshua that the kingdom of Og the giant included all Bashan unto Salcah; and the Israelites took